Breaking Up With Your Girlfriend: Is it OK to Leave?

If you’re thinking about breaking up with your girlfriend and ask friends (or Google) for advice on how to do it, you’ll probably come across this standard advice:

Break up with your girlfriend face to face, not through an email or text message.

Use the approach of “It’s not you, it’s me.”

Speak from your heart and then allow her to have some space.

Be sensitive to her feelings.

While these tips are useful, they don’t help those of you who are having trouble getting over the first hurdle to break-ups. What you’re looking for is a method of breaking up that minimizes the pain and suffering for you both.

You may be hesitant to break up with your girlfriend because you feel guilty about ending a long relationship, or you’re afraid of how she will react. Or maybe your girlfriend depends on you and you worry about how she’ll do on her own. But at the same time that you don’t want to ruin her life, you are desperate to get your freedom back.

Here is the most important thing you need to know right now: You have permission to go.

Heartbreak is a part of life, and you can’t protect your girlfriend from getting hurt. There are no guarantees in love and everyone should enter into relationships with that understanding. People grow apart for many reasons, and you have permission to let go for any reason.

Maybe things started out perfectly, but your girlfriend eventually revealed an uglier side that was jealous and controlling. Or maybe you simply had a change of heart and want to move on. The point is: You have permission to move on.

Being in a relationship is a choice, and just as you made a choice to enter into a relationship, you can make a choice to leave it. It doesn’t matter if you’ve been together for 10 days or 10 years. A healthy relationship can’t be built on pity. Otherwise you are simply wasting your time and hers.